Yeah, youre right, Jesus seemed to suggest that child-poisoners should be drowned, rather than shot.

"And whoever receives one such child in My name receives Me; but whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to stumble, it would be better for him to have a heavy millstone hung around his neck, and to be drowned in the depth of the sea.

But my Bible has an Old Testament too, where shooting (stoning) is generally the preferred method.

Personally I'm open-minded on the topic.

"Well actually, she's not REALLY my daughter. But she does like to call me Daddy... at certain moments..."

droid wrote:
So what happens to "thou shalt not kill" ? wasn't that absolute, or were there exceptions?
Honestly i'm no religion expert.

It's a mistranslation.

What the Hebrew says is something like "Thou shalt not slay wantonly." In other words don't commit murder. You can't kill without a good reason. As reflected in our law (justifiable homicide, death penalty) and also in our consciences aka "natural law" aka "common sense" (e.g. the ending of every movie where the bad guy gets what's coming to him).

I'm not sure if the mistranslation was a deliberate one, by Protestant fanatics (they are on record with other deliberate mistranslations) or it is just that the word "kill" has drifted in meaning since the olden days.

"Well actually, she's not REALLY my daughter. But she does like to call me Daddy... at certain moments..."

In January, Prime Minister Tony Abbott urged President Widodo to show mercy to Chan and Sukumaran, and Foreign Minister Julie Bishop wrote directly to Indonesian foreign minister Retno Marsudi requesting that the mens' lives be spared.

The Australian government has tried to persuade the Indonesians that the men are genuinely remorseful for their crimes, counselling others about the dangers of drugs, and introducing art and computer classes in their prison - Sukumaran recently had his powerful death row art exhibited in London.

The real problem is the moral cancer in the soul of Anglos.

"Well actually, she's not REALLY my daughter. But she does like to call me Daddy... at certain moments..."

Singapore, Malaysia, China, Vietnam and some other Asian countries are also executing foreign and local drug dealers, shall we boycott them too?
It's almost impossible to boycott all and everything which is made in China. - Thailand was killing a lot of drug dealers during raids along its borders.

Muslim countries like Saudi Arabia or Iran are also executing drug dealers.

About the death penalty itself, in USA there are executions too, and even sometimes here in Japan.

OutWest wrote:Its done...eight were just executed. However, the Filipinas Mary Jane Veloso, was given a last minute reprieve.

Damn manginas.

It seems new evidence popped up and she was most likely duped. Should she have known, with her bag being as heavy as it was, that something was wrong? Yes. She is at the very least a very naive and stupid person. But it's disgusting to see the (unknowing) drug mules die for something they get so little for in return, and see those who get rich off their blood stay out of trouble with a few bribes here and there.

To my understanding, several of the executed foreigners were knowingly and actively involved in drug peddling, whereas in the case of Veloso, it was hidden in her bag and new evidence and a suggest made in the Philippines of her former employer suggests she may have been unaware the drugs was ever there. This has very little to do with the Indonesian judges being "manginas", and everything to do with serving justice.

They are fighting symptoms, but not the source. Why? Because the Indonesian authorities, and the Filipino authorities and others, get money from drug lords to keep their mouths shut. And every once in a while a drug mule or a small time player is sacrificed to keep up appearances. Meanwhile, most of the drugs and those carrying them simply slip through the maze.

OutWest wrote:Its done...eight were just executed. However, the Filipinas Mary Jane Veloso, was given a last minute reprieve.

Damn manginas.

Somewhat true when looking up the history of Australians and other foreigners convicted in Indonesia.
I do not find any data about Indonesian citizens.

Never a foreign woman was executed, even not sentenced to life in jail, while men are serving either a life sentence or are facing execution for an identical crime.

Australian women got lenient sentences in Indonesia compared to men.

Renae Lawrence was caught with more than 2 kg heroin strapped on her body and she gets away with 20 years in jail, best known Corby got 20 years for carrying over 4 kg of Cannabis and is already released, after serving only 9 years claiming 'mental illness'. No.1 is fashion model Michelle Leslie, with ecstasy, she had money, it is said but not proven of course that her judges were bribed, insisting tearfully she is now a Muslim convert and was out of Indonesia within 3 months and later again of course as a half-naked model on the catwalk.

About poor Filipinas like Veloso, I see it as a dirty political game to save face. It's easier to execute several men (especially those black men from Nigeria) than 1 woman. Nobody really cares about men. So finally, when the execution is ready to start, in the very last moment - execute 8 men but spare 1 poor woman.

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Personally, I prefer the way how it is done here in Japan, the death penalty is only possible for repeat offenders for some few certain crimes.

There is no death penalty for drug dealers in the Japanese law, however there are remarkably long jail sentences. Luckily for most foreign criminals Japan has a prisoner exchange agreement with many countries and most of them are deported after serving only 1/3 of their original sentence.

The Japanese justice is maybe the best solution how to deal with drug related foreign criminals.

I dislike the European softy justice, where criminals get away with lenient sentences and enjoy jailtime for a few weeks similar to vacation in a hotel room.

Banano wrote:I wonder if things would have ended up differenty if 2 ring leaders were david becham look alikes or some other good lookin anglo men instead of chinese/sri lankan.

Might sound superficial but having good looks can make differece between life and death.

Well I highly doubt it unless they had very rich or influential parents perhaps. Malaysia has executed white guys before and Thai jails are full of farangs and other assorted foreigners, some who are quite good looking. There was a book written by one western guy who did a lot of prison time in Indonesia.

I think there was case many years ago where western daughter of a high ranking insurance exec somehow got out of a multi decade prison sentence for drugs.

If you get caught with drugs in most Asian countries, it's almost certain that you won't escape a very long prison sentence (often life) or in case of SP, Malaysia, Indonesia, or China, a death sentence. And given the conditions of prisons of the region, death sentence might be best you could hope for. It's not like doing soft time in Norway!